Estratégia em todo lado - não é winner-take-all (Parte VIII)

Há anos que escrevo sobre o futuro das plataformas - Estratégia em todo lado - não é winner-take-all:

• Parte I
• Parte II
• Parte III
• Parte IV
• Parte V
• Parte VI
• Parte VII

Por isso, sorri ao ler "Digital Davids, global Goliaths, and the Web3 sling".

O artigo sugere que, embora a dominância de plataformas do tipo "winner-take-all" como o Google e a Amazon tenha levado a um controlo significativo do mercado e a uma disparidade económica, há uma tendência de mudança para a descentralização com o advento das tecnologias Web3. A Web3, com os seus mecanismos de "decentralized trust mechanisms like blockchain and smart contracts", oferecerá um novo quadro que poderá potencialmente reduzir o poder monopolista dessas plataformas.

Segundo o artigo a Web3 poderá permitir:

• Reduzir a dependência de plataformas centrais através de sistemas descentralizados, que poderão empoderar entidades menores e novos participantes.
• Deslocar o poder económico ao alterar as formas como os dados são possuídos e geridos, redistribuindo potencialmente o valor capturado por grandes plataformas.
• Encorajar sistemas de apoio regulatórios e de pares que favoreçam a concorrência justa e abordem desequilíbrios de poder inerentes à economia digital actual.

Algures escrevi aqui no blogue que não interessa estar na plataforma com a maior audiência, interessa estar na plataforma com a audiência-alvo.

Uma iniciativa interessante

 Uma iniciativa interessante, "A Canadian ‘Buy Local’ Effort Fights Amazon on Its Own Turf":

"A website called Not Amazon was created to drive sales to more than 4,000 independent stores in four cities. The initiative aims to keep expanding.

...

Inspired to build a more comprehensive list, Ms. Haberstroh promptly created an Instagram post, tagging independent businesses and shopkeepers across Toronto. Included was a new website, Not-Amazon.ca — a URL that she had bought for $2.99.

Introduced as a local list to help keep small businesses alive, Not Amazon was created “so you don’t have to give any money to Amazon this year!” the post read.

What began as a Google spreadsheet with more than 160 businesses collated initially from Ms. Haberstroh’s memory and research became a directory of hundreds that have a website and a high-quality photo and offer nationwide shipping, curbside pickup or delivery.

So far, the website has garnered more than half a million page views and grown to include 4,000 businesses across Toronto, Calgary, Halifax and Vancouver. The site is now submission-based, and thousands of businesses are awaiting Ms. Haberstroh’s approval."

"It's time to think small" (parte II)

Mão amiga remeteu-me este artigo "Amazon Taking on Farfetch With New Luxury Brand Platform":

"Amazon (NASDAQ:AMZN) is developing a new platform for luxury brands that could bring it into direct competition with the existing luxury fashion marketplace Farfetch (NYSE:FTCH).

According to industry site WWD, a dozen luxury brands are reportedly ready to debut on the platform in September where they will not only have full control over their online stores, but will also be able to tap into Amazon's customer service operations and utilize its rapid delivery network."

Quem segue este blogue sabe que não gosto da abordagem da Farfetch como máquina de queimar dinheiro para ganhar quota de mercado.

O que fariam na posição da Farfetch? Como reagiriam a um movimento deste tipo? Como se diferenciariam? Remember, até mesmo no mundo das plataformas "não é winner-take-all"

"It's time to think small"

Ontem enquanto terminava um esboço sobre este postal um canal de televisão emitia pela enésima vez o filme "As Good As It Gets". Quando desliguei o televisor as três personagens principais (Melvin, Carol e Simon) seguiam de carro a caminho de Baltimore.

Baltimore ... e recordo: "Faz-me lembrar ter descoberto que na cidade de Baltimore, só na cidade de Baltimore, antes de 1920 existiam 19 marcas fabricantes de automóveis" ou "Na bacia do Arade, deste lado do Parchal e Ferragudo e em Portimão, chegou a haver 23 fábricas de conservas." E isto faz-me pensar nas cervejeiras americanas:

A maioria das pessoas que escreve sobre a economia online fala das plataformas como uma corrida para o dominio total, para tirar o maior retorno possível do efeito de escala e da rede de conexões. Daí a corrida das Uber, das Farfetch e dos Facebooks deste mundo.

Eu não acredito nessa leitura. É claro que essa corrida faz sentido agora que a internet está na sua infância e o centrão do meio-termo domina. No entanto, na internet como no resta da economia, o centrão vai dar lugar às tribos. Por isso, também nas plataformas não teremos um único vencedor a ganhar tudo, também nas plataformas poderemos ter muitos vencedores. No final deste postal listo uma série de postais que publiquei ao longo dos anos aqui no blogue sobre esta temática.

Entretanto, esta semana li um artigo interessante acerca disto tudo, "In Defense of The Small Social Network":

"It’s time to agitate for a new version of the internet, one where our only choices aren’t boredom or fear, one where the internet isn’t a joyless place run by billionaires. It’s time to think small.
...
Ello, for example, launched in 2014 and aimed to be a better kind of network — one less cluttered and commercialized than Facebook. Did it save online discourse? No. But it was a step in the right direction. Ello still exists, has a little over 3 million users as of last year, and is mostly used by artists and designers. Despite its miniscule size, it’s actually a success story, providing a community where artists can showcase themselves. Contrast Ello with YouTube, where the loudest voice in the room often wins, and only creators willing to accept sponsorships and do whatever gets the most eyeballs can thrive.
Other small social networks, like Mastodon, are flourishing in their own little ways too. Mastodon takes a totally different approach to social media: Instead of one centralized group moderating and curating content, the platform allows users to have their own private groups and timelines, and decide what kind of content is displayed themselves"

Quem é que precisa de plataformas que cheguem a todo o lado?
As empresas que trabalham para o centrão, para a média. Aquilo a que Seth Godin chamou de industrialistas, os que procuram a estabilidade e temem a concorrência e a sua destruição criativa. Seth sublinha que não foram as pessoas que criaram o mercado de massas, foram os industrialistas que o fizeram para poder despachar o seu vómito para o maior número possível de pessoas e agora, com Mongo, esse mundo está a morrer.

Entre Junho de 2016 e Julho de 2019 a série "Estratégia em todo lado - não é winner-take-all" já teve sete episódios. No entanto, antes disso já escrevia sobre Mongo e as plataformas:

• Acerca das plataformas de negócio;
• Confundir o Estanhistão com Comoditização... suspeito

"É claro que muitos olham para hoje e vêem as Uber e as AirBnB e adivinham um futuro dominado por essas mega-plataformas. Prefiro considerá-las como entidades transitórias, úteis para dinamitar as grilhetas criadas pelos governos para proteger os incumbentes do Normalistão. Depois? Depois, virão as plataformas de 2ª geração ou cooperativas, porque existe estratégia em todo o lado, às vezes é só uma questão de tempo."

• Isto é só o começo... (Abril de 2016) 
• Plataformas, Mongo, emprego e confiança nas marcas (Fevereiro de 2016)
• Plataformas de 2º geração, o começo (Novembro de 2015)
• O pós-Uber(ismo) (Outubro de 2015)
• Reflexão-previsão acerca do futuro das plataformas (Junho de 2015)

"Estratégia em todo lado - não é winner-take-all" (parte VII)

A minha crença de que, passada a fase infantil das plataformas, veremos o quão absurdo terá sido pensar que seria "winner-take-all".

Mais uma peça para o argumentário através do artigo "Clay Shirky on Mega-Universities and Scale":

"At the beginning of this decade, higher education looked as if it might become winner-take-all,
...
The mega-est university in U.S. history, one genuinely operating at Walmart scale relative to its peers, peaked nearly a decade ago and has since imploded. This complicates talk of future mega-universities, both because the original mega-university failed so rapidly, and because the reversal of Phoenix’s fortunes turns out to be a general pattern.
...
We are not entering a world where the largest university operates at outsized scale, we’re leaving that world; Phoenix was far more dominant in 2011 than any school will be in 2021. There will always be a biggest school, and it will offer mainly or solely online education, but as online instruction and marketing become more widespread, constraints on mega-universities’ growth are likely to prevent any future school from achieving Phoenix’s disproportionate scale.
...
What the mega-university story gets right is that online education is transforming higher education. What it gets wrong is the belief that transformation must end with consolidation around a few large-scale institutions. The decade now ending has seen a dramatic reduction in the size of the largest online school, both in total enrollment and relative to all other schools. Instead of an “Amazon vs. the rest” dynamic, online education is turning into something much more widely adopted, where the biggest schools are simply the upper end of a continuum, not so different from their competitors, and not worth treating as members of a separate category."

"niche retailers with strong identities" (parte II)

Parte I.

Um exemplo do que quero dizer quando defendo que o futuro das plataformas não é winner-take-all, "Bitchute".

Trabalhar para os extremos é terrível para quem quer triunfar no centrão.

"niche retailers with strong identities"

Tão interessante, tão em sintonia com a visão de Mongo como um mundo de tribos de interesses assimétricos, tão de acordo com "tu não és do meu sangue", tão de acordo com a ambivalência face a Bieber. Ninguém quer ser tratado como plancton. Trechos retirados de "The global village needs walls":

"Facebook has been a giant experiment in understanding humanity. It has proven that we actually don’t want to be part of a global community — we are instead a species of small groups and tribes. If you’re part of everything, you’re not invested in anything, and that feels bad. “Everyone, no exception, must have a tribe, an alliance with which to jockey for power and territory, to demonize the enemy, to organize rallies, and raise flags,”
...
So what does this mean for business? For one, it creates an opening for a smorgasbord of social networks and social businesses.
.
“There should be social networks around every conceivable interest,” [Moi ici: Como não recordar o que escrevi, ao arrepio do mainstream, sobre as plataformas universais, não é winner-take-all]
...
“The really exciting model is not one company to rule them all, but distributed companies and distributed wealth and revenue, and a social experience built around these supernodes,” said Bianchini, whose company is making a big bet that we’re headed in this direction. Some recent trends seem to bear it out. The number of niche social networks is exploding,
...
Such fracturing of the online world is a headwind even Amazon will eventually have to battle. The bigger Amazon gets, the less it feels like it connects with your personal identity — even with algorithms that figure out what you’re most likely to buy.[Moi ici: Recordar o que escrevo sobre o big data e a miudagem]
.
Just as microbrews stole customers from giant, least-common-denominator brands such as Budweiser, niche retailers with strong identities are likely to be more of a challenge to Amazon than some other centralized behemoth.[Moi ici: O que escrevo neste blogue desde sempre... cuidado com os gurus da Junqueira]"

Acerca da lealdade às marcas

A propósito de "The Death Of Brand Loyalty: Cultural Shifts Mean It's Gone Forever":

"In the old days, consumers would find a brand that did what it promised: ... In the busy, sometimes overwhelming lives of primary grocery shoppers, a brand earned its place in the pantry or laundry room or refrigerator, and consumer packaged goods manufacturers were rewarded with consistent purchase.
...
Consumers are not inclined to be loyal to brands as they once were because the underlying value of loyalty itself is no longer particularly relevant. In the old world, loyalty was good and something we aspired to give and receive across all aspects of life . . . with friends, family, employers, dentists, doctors, bankers, and maybe even the federal government. But generational experiences have made sticking with “tried and true” a sucker bet. Loyalty means remaining the same. Not exploring alternatives.
...
The preference for “new and different” is well known to the Procter & Gambles, General Mills, and Kimberly-Clarks of the world that are making acquisitions, unloading what can’t be resuscitated, and funding their own VCs. They recognize that establishing and maintaining ongoing connections between consumers and their brands is becoming less and less realistic."

Já não é a primeira vez que aqui torço o nariz a esta teoria de que os clientes são cada vez menos leais a uma marca. Recordo Simondson e o que escrevi em "Plataformas, Mongo, emprego e confiança nas marcas" ou em "Leu aqui há vários anos...".

O exemplo da Chobani ou da Halo Top por um lado, e o das Procters and Gambles e Krafts deste mundo suportam a minha teoria de que não é a lealdade às marcas que está em causa, mas a lealdade às marcas do mercado de massas, as marcas do século XX, as marcas do Normalistão, as marcas amorfas que têm medo de desagradar, que têm medo de não serem apetecíveis para os que estão dentro da caixa e que acabam na suckiness dos gigantes.

" there is too much complexity and too much uncertainty"

"In the 21st century, there is too much complexity and too much uncertainty for a focus on “maximizing profits this quarter” to work very well. The landscape is littered with companies that tried this, and they simply did not understand — either because they could not understand or refused to understand — the complex consequences of their actions.
...
The new story of business is about creating as much value for all these stakeholders as possible, and this of course includes creating profits for shareholders. In the global economy, customers, suppliers, employees, communities, and financiers — shareholders plus bondholders plus banks and other sources of capital — are all intertwined. The winning business models of the 21st century figure out how to get these interests going in the same direction, with as few trade-offs as possible.
...
The stakeholder approach sets forth a new conceptualization of business, in which business is understood as a set of relationships and management’s job is to help shape these relationships. [Moi ici: Aqui] Business is about how customers, suppliers, employees, financiers, communities, and managers interact to create value, and there is no single formula for balancing or prioritizing stakeholders. Creating that balance is part of what management is all about, and it will be different for different companies at different times."

Recordar "Ecossistemas em economia" e vantagem de pensar na maximização do valor criado a nível de um ecossistema.

Trechos retirados de "The Social Responsibility of Business Is to Create Value for Stakeholders"

Estratégia em todo lado - não é winner-take-all (parte VI)

Parte V.

Em linha com o que defendo aqui há anos:

"What has allowed digital ecosystems to become so dominant? The answer lies in a winner-take-all dynamic of competition, which allows winners to reach tremendous scale and build impregnable moats around their positions.
...
Orchestrators of digital ecosystems have all focused on exploiting this winner-take-all dynamic to establish dominant positions. Nondigital players, by contrast, lacking the kind of advantages noted above, have mostly not succeeded in building digital ecosystems.
...
digital ecosystems rely on the winner-take-all dynamic underpinned by zero marginal costs, network effects, access to data, and user convenience. But hybrid ecosystems [digital-physical ecosystems] cannot succeed through technology and scale alone. Operating in the physical realm means dealing with the messiness of hardware. Hybrid ecosystems tend to have a narrower scope because they require deep domain knowledge and dense business relationships."

Trechos retirados de "Getting Physical: The Rise of Hybrid Ecosystems"

A magia da interacção

 Ao longo dos anos tenho aqui sublinhado o papel da interacção nos ecossistemas da procura, para fugir à comoditização, para subir na escala de valor.

"The Joint Sphere: Value Co-creation Opportunities.
In the joint sphere, the customer’s value creation is different. In this part of the value process, the two actors meet and interact with each other.
...
What may happen in such direct interactions, if the actors allow it, is that the provider’s and the customer’s processes—the firm’s service-providing process and the customer’s consumption and value-creating process—merge into one interactive, collaborative and dialogical process. The two processes become one, and a platform of co-creation emerges. Such direct interactions can be both face-to-face interactions and interactions with smart technologies. If both actors are willing to do it and know how to do it, the service provider may engage with the customer’s value-creating process and co-create value with him or her at this stage of the value process. If they do not want to or do not know how to do it, no value co-creation takes place, in spite of the existence of a platform of co-creation. In that case, the provider’s role is restricted to continue facilitating the customer’s value creation.
.
Thus, in the joint sphere, the role of the firm may be that of a value co-creator, where the firm’s goal is to, when needed and appropriate, actively influence the customer’s value-creating process and, thus, his or her value fulfilment. On the other hand, the customer’s role is to be the value creator and perhaps also a value co-creator with the provider. The customer’s goal is the same as in the customer sphere: to use and integrate resources with the aim to become better off. In the joint sphere, the actors may switch roles, and the provider becomes the customer and the customer becomes the service provider of, for example, actionable information and feedback. Viewed from below, from a managerial micro-perspective, co-creation only takes place in direct interactions, provided that a platform of co-creation is formed. In all other situations, the firm can only facilitate the customer’s value creation.
...
From a managerial point of view, co-creation can have both positive and negative consequences.[Moi ici: Quando o tema não é abordado de forma preparada, planeada, é provável que por vezes quem interage não tenha consciência das prioridades e das consequências dos seus actos e comportamentos]
...
From the micro-vantage point, one also observes that the firm can do much more than only offer value propositions. If the actors’ processes indeed merge in the joint sphere into an interactive, collaborative and dialogical process and a platform of co-creation comes into existence, the firm has the opportunity to influence the customer’s value process and how this process develops, and in the end, the customer’s value fulfilment. Because this also may have an impact on the customer’s preferences and future purchasing decisions, it also has fundamental implications for marketing. In the service marketing literature, this part of the marketing process is called interactive marketing, and the service employees involved in it are termed part-time marketers."

Trechos retirados de "On Value and Value Creation in Service: A Management Perspective" de Christian Grönroos publicado por Jornal of Creating Value.

Plataformizar um produto

Um texto que pode lançar numa empresa uma discussão sobre como evoluir um produto/serviço para uma abordagem baseada numa plataforma multilateral: "Finding the Platform in Your Product":

"companies that weren’t born as platform businesses rarely realize that they can—at least partially—turn their products and services into an MSP (multisided platforms)"

Ecossistemas em economia

Há mais de 10 anos, em "Subir na escala de valor" usei aqui no blogue pela primeira vez a palavra ecossistema aplicada a uma empresa e às partes interessadas com que interage.

Desde então já a usei o marcador "ecossistema" quase 200 vezes.

Ultimamente comecei a encontrar textos interessantes sobre a vantagem de pensar na maximização do valor criado a nível de ecossistema:

• "The market is a goal collective"
• Propostas de valor, ecossistemas e pivôs
• Plataformas e ecossistemas

Esta semana, parece que a palavra ecossistema está a pegar:

• Introducing Ecosystem Thinking
• What Exactly Do We Mean by Systems?

"What won’t you be?" (parte II)

Parte I.

"Almost nothing in our daily lives is actually a winner take all competition.
Somewhere, there's someone fitter, faster, thinner, quicker, smarter, more popular or richer than you. And there's someone else fitter, faster, thinner, quicker, smarter, more popular or richer than they are. And you're (far) ahead of someone else who is busy looking at you from behind.
And yet we see people angry because someone's passing their car, or gaining more followers online. They mistakenly believe it's a race. It rarely is.
If you can use your situation as fuel, fuel to dig in and care more and do better, by all means.
But if not, ignore it. Do your work, not theirs."

Trecho retirado de "Winner take all"

Estratégia em todo lado - não é winner-take-all (parte V)

"1. Network effects: The winner does not always take all.
The first common misconception is that in a digital world, the winner takes all. Many business models that make extensive use of digital technology have network-type properties. This means that the more users and content-providers you sign up, the better the business model will work.
...
That logic sometimes holds, but more often it does not. That is because networks are rarely exclusive. Travel to Singapore, for example, and you will see why. Every taxi driver has at least two mobile phones in her window: if a ride comes in on one network, she will click “accept” and turn the other off. Taxi drivers are invariably part of multiple competing networks. Similarly, most riders have at least two apps on their smartphone. When they require a ride, they will quickly check both apps and then use the one where a taxi is available quickest and at the best rate.
.
It is a misconception to think that network effects inevitably and always lead to a winner-take-all market. Sometimes that may be true, but there are at least as many network-type markets that can easily sustain a variety of players."

 Em linha com o que aqui defendemos:

• Estratégia em todo lado - não é winner-take-all
• Estratégia em todo lado - não é winner-take-all (parte IV)

Trechos retirados de "What So Many Strategists Get Wrong About Digital Disruption"

Uma novela sobre Mongo (parte XI)

 Parte I, parte II, parte III, parte IV, parte V, parte VI, parte VII e parte VIII, parte IXe parte X.

Ontem, numa caminhada matinal li:

"For most of the industrial era the only option for having goods and services was to own them. If we wanted to have anything, we had to buy it. This was also the way industrial society was set up. It moved society away from the traditional ideas of shared resources into consumption silo mode. The industrial era made many things affordable for the first time. The rational choice was to purchase and own, so we accumulated goods and stored them at home for when they were needed. Being able to have everything we needed, and places to store it all (fridges, cupboards, spare rooms and garages), reduced a lot of the friction that existed before industrial communities came into being and resources were shared.
...
Much of the friction of sharing is now coming back out of the commercial system. While vehicles gave us access to vast geography on demand, the internet is giving us access to vast information, entertainment and even physical goods on demand. Many of the things we had no choice but to buy if we wanted access to them are changing the way they come to market. Increasingly, we have an option to buy or to simply access an asset on demand. We are choosing the latter."

Depois, à hora do almoço encontrei "The Original Sharing Economy" e fiquei a pensar no potencial do modelo de negócio da Sharing Depot.

Agora pensem no impacte disto no emprego, na impostagem e no PIB.

Trechos iniciais retirados de "The Great Fragmentation"

Ou está neste quadrante? (parte II)

Parte I.

"Ecosystem Drivers, in the upper right quadrant, have the best of both worlds: deep end-customer knowledge and a broad supply base.
...
they create value for themselves while extracting rent from others.
...
If you are an Ecosystem Driver, you’ll want to keep pushing the boundaries in both dimensions, increasing your knowledge of end customers and the breadth of offerings available to them.
...
the prospects for creating value are greatest for companies that participate in ecosystems rather than in value chains, so Ecosystem Drivers have the greatest potential for value creation and Suppliers the smallest. [Moi ici: Segue-se um ponto muito importante] All four paths are viable routes to enduring success, provided you are clear on what your generic strategy is and what that strategy requires. If, however, you are losing customers or growing more slowly than your market, you should consider moving to a different quadrant, either by expanding your knowledge of your end customers or by becoming more of an ecosystem."

"All four paths are viable routes" é uma forma de expressar que não existe apenas uma estratégia válida em cada momento. Penso logo no Brexit. O Brexit vai ser mau para o Reino Unido e provocar muita disrupção e sofrimento? Sim!

Os britânicos ficam condenados a definhar?
Claro que não, terão sim de desenhar novas estratégias para tirar partido das oportunidades criadas pela nova situação e minimizar as ameaças entretanto criadas.

"If, however, you are losing customers or growing more slowly than your market, you should consider moving to a different quadrant" isto é o que muitas vezes os apoios bem intencionados dos intervencionistas ingénuos impedem que ocorra porque os decisores recebem o apoio e ficam à espera que a realidade volte ao que era antes da disrupção.










Trechos retirados de "Four Business Models for the Digital Age"

"deviam aprender com estes casos da vida real"

Ontem o Aranha ligou-me a dizer que tinha de ver um programa que estava a dar no canal Travel. Na altura não podia ver televisão e, depois, confirmei que não tenho acesso ao canal Travel.

No entanto o Aranha tinha-me deixado com as coordenadas. Program "Hotel Impossible", temporada 4, episódio 12. Após uma breve pesquisa no youtube encontrei uma versão pirata aqui (perto do minuto 30).

Ao fim de pouco tempo percebi o porquê da insistência do Aranha. O episódio é sobre o caso de um hotel num bom local, um hotel arrumado e limpo, um hotel com trabalhadores dedicados ... mas um hotel que perdia dinheiro.

Uma das grandes lições que o consultor não se cansa de martelar na cabeça do gerente é: a importância do revenue management.

Outras lições que sublinho:

• a importância do ecossistema de parceiros. Desde o catering até à rede de gente capaz de criar experiências que valorizem o hotel como destino. Como se o hotel funcionasse como uma plataforma.
• a importância dos eventos. Uma outra forma de fazer do hotel uma plataforma, uma outra forma de aumentar a rentabilidade do hotel ainda que fugindo da função tradicional de um hotel. O que levanta a necessidade de desenvolver parcerias com entidades que possam fazer com que o hotel entre em novos ecossistemas.

Em lado nenhum se fala na necessidade de reduzir pessoal, de cortar nos custos, de aumentar a eficiência. Por todo o lado se aborda o tema do aumento da produtividade pela actuação no numerador.

Muitos académicos, jornalistas e comentadores económicos deviam aprender com estes casos da vida real.

BTW, lembram-se dos descontos nas portagens? OMG! Qual era o meu conselho em 2008?

"Como podem tornar a experiência da estadia memorável?"

Ah! Desconfio que no Algarve não havia na altura o tal ecossistema de parceiros em potência... e volto a recordar Theodor Levitte:

"Lembram-se do que Theodore Levitt  escreveu na HBR em 1960 sobre os gestores de caminhos de ferro? Pode ser dito o mesmo hoje sobre os da hotelaria."

Pensar à frente

A propósito de "Amazon Business Has Painted a Bullseye on the Industrial Supply Market":

"There is a litany of reasons why Amazon Business should keep industrial supply executives awake at night. Originally, Amazon Business targeted small and medium-sized companies, but it was met with unexpected enthusiasm by its large customers.
...
Ryan, bullish, believes his 5,000-strong sales force is key to Grainger's success. Amazon won't be able to replicate that advantage anytime soon, he suggests. However, while the service offerings Grainger supplies with product orders set it apart, there's little to stop Amazon Business from developing these services alongside its product business. Or, they could simply run their margins thin enough to draw off Grainger's customers, who would only return to Grainger for the consultations they offer on energy efficiency, workplace safety, and the like.[Moi ici: Pensei logo na Dow e Xiameter mas aqui estamos no campeonato do retalho, não do fabrico]
...
Just as with food distribution, Amazon can bring transformative disruption to an industry that has not significantly innovated in more than a generation. In the process, it would turn many established firms into commoditized merchants relying on Amazon for order fulfillment.
.
No matter the value-add provided with a purchase, a screw is a screw and a drill press is a drill press. As long as the product quality doesn't suffer, industrial supply customers will gladly click a different button if it means cost reduction and convenience.
...
The right play for an incumbent is not to double down through acquisitions or increasing its salesforce. Instead, incumbents should be looking to go on the offensive by creating an industry-wide marketplace in which competitors participate and become subordinate players to the platform owner. Anyone looking to adopt this strategy should start with the small potatoes and scoop them up into the network and farm loyalty from their customers. Once the demand scales up, bigger players on both sides will be drawn to the network, granting it sought-after critical mass and market power."

Plataformas cooperativas

"Blockchain, however, cleverly makes a trustworthy but ownerless database possible. “Which means you can have platforms that grow without central owners of that platform,” Ramge argues. All the data points that run an auction (the items, their photos, the bids, when they came in) that could all go into a blockchain located on thousands of users’ machines. Creators could build hundreds of different interfaces, all of which would use that same shared database."

Recordar a nossa previsão acerca das plataformas cooperativas.

Trecho retirado de "Can Blockchains Disrupt the Internet’s Monopolies?"

BTW, "A Second Internet, Coming Soon, Courtesy of the Blockchain"